Surgical management of drooling.

The presence of drooling is an indication of an upset in the coordinated mechanism of facial, tongue, and palate muscles. This upset is particularly common in children with cerebral palsy. After extensive investigation and the establishment of the relative significance of the drooling and the degree of cerebral palsy, positive treatment with physiotherapy is then commenced. Those patients whose conditions fail to improve adequately with positive physiotherapy can be helped by staging surgery. Surgery treatment is carried out as a planned procedure. The submandibular ducts are transposed. Submucosal dissection and redirection of salivary flow from the submandibular glands excludes the necessity for extirpation of the salivary glands.